The new question on everyone's lips: have you been jabbed?

When the Boris government announced the start of the coronavirus vaccine programme, the impression give was that it would be a super orderly affair, with care homes (staff and residents), NHS frontline workers and people aged over 90 getting the jabs first. Then in strict order of age, working downwards through the 80s to the 75-80s, 70s, 60s, 50s etc until everyone down to 50 has been done by April, and then head off down through the 40s, 30s and 20s. All beautifully planned, every jab given in order of age and/or health vulnerability. But it seems not. Judging by the questioning of many people on a very unscientific basis, the conclusion is: it's totally random. There IS no perfect age list. You get a phone call and are invited to turn up at a centre somewhere and that's what you do. Never mind whether you are 70, 75, 80 or 88. Never mind whether you have a partner of roughly the same age who could have been offered the jab at the same time. I know of 80-year-olds who haven't heard a thing from anyone, yet people in their early 70s who have been done and dusted and are looking forward to their booster jab in 12 weeks' time. As a result of this random process, the main item of conversation now hitting the country is: "Have you been done?" The other question is: "Why isn't the government giving jabs first to those who have to work in the office or wherever, so that they can carry on earning money for their families without the fear of catching the infection and bringing it home to the rest of the family. In other words, why are the elderly being done before the young and job-dependent men and women? The answer I guess is that in order to bring down the terrible death toll the best way for the government to see instant results from the vaccines is to focus on those most likely to die from Covid. The statistics still show that the vast majority of those who have died have been elderly or people with underlying health problems. But the young have died too. It should be government policy to get the vaccines to the younger generations as quickly as possible. Ideally, vaccinating the 20-40-year-olds at the same time, ie, coming up from the younger end as they come down from the older end and meeting in the middle. That would be fairer and if it means doubling the orders for the vaccines, so be it. But if this were to happen, it would need to be less random than the current vaccination programme. There has to be a degree of certainty about it. If your neighbour aged, say 66, gets his or her vaccine but the guy up the road aged 77 has not, something must be wrong.